1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a print data generation device, a print data generation method and a computer-readable medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, a multi-core processor has been developed, which is composed by integrating a plurality of arithmetic operation parts (hereinafter, referred to as cores) such as processor cores in one package, and enhances processing performance by dispersing processing to the respective cores and performing parallel processing.
In particular, in an image forming apparatus such as a multi-function peripheral (MFP) and a printer, the following has been proposed. Specifically, by using this multi-core processor, analysis processing for analyzing data in a Page Description Language (PDL) format and generating data in an intermediate language (DL: Display List) format, rasterization processing for generating data in a bitmap format from the data in the intermediate language format, processing for transferring, as print data, the data in the bitmap format to a print unit and forming an image, and the like are assigned to the respective cores, and the respective pieces of the processing are executed in parallel, whereby speed enhancement of a series of the processing related to print output is achieved.
For example, there are disclosed: a technology for, in the case of performing rasterization in parallel by using a plurality of processors, detecting a processor on standby for processing, and assigning rasterization processing for an unprocessed band region to the processor on standby for the processing (refer to Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2003-51019 as Patent Literature 1); and a technology for distributing, for each page, PDL data or intermediate data or a display list to a plurality of central processing units (CPUs) (refer to Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2006-159738 as Patent Literature 2).
However, in Patent Literature 1, such a band to be rasterized is assigned only by determining states of the processors, and accordingly, in the case where there occurs a lack of a memory region for use in the rasterization processing, the processing is stopped temporarily. Moreover, in Patent Literature 2, the CPUs perform the processing for each page, and accordingly, reduction of a total processing time for a plurality of pages can be achieved; however, reduction of a processing time per page cannot be achieved. In addition, at the time of distributing the data, a state of the memory region into which the data is to be expanded is not considered, and it is apprehended that the processing for the distributed data may be stopped. As described above, even in the case where the plurality of arithmetic operation parts are provided, such a problem occurs that the respective arithmetic operation parts are not used effectively in response to the states of the arithmetic operation parts and the state of the memory region.